WTF Indeed:the801: a randomly chosen French worker laughs at you while enjoying mai tais on the beach of Ibiza in the middle of one of 3 yearly month-long breaks from his grueling 35 hour a week job.

Big economic powerhouse, the French are.

I mean, it's the fifth best economy in the world, so, yes, it is. And they get a legally guaranteed 31 days of paid time off. Germany, which is the fourth best economy in the world, gets 34 days of paid time off. Japan, which is the third best economy in the world, has a minimum of 10 days of paid time off per year, which rises to a minimum 20 days off after your sixth year at a job. China, which is the second best economy in the world, has a graduated system ranging from minimum 5 days off to minimum `5 days off if you've got over 20 years of seniority.

The United States?Nothing. We get nothing. There is literally no law guaranteeing vacation time, unlike almost every other country in the world.

Thank gods for the union. Can you imagine how screwed these workers would be if the management declared that the contract was a mistake and they didn't have anyone to fight for them?

I mean, all three of the management negotiators signed off on this and the union had time for a vote and after all of that now management is basically saying, "Lol, you didn't actually take our agreement to this deal to actually be binding, right? Here's the next round of concessions that we want."

SphericalTime:Thank gods for the union. Can you imagine how screwed these workers would be if the management declared that the contract was a mistake and they didn't have anyone to fight for them?

I mean, all three of the management negotiators signed off on this and the union had time for a vote and after all of that now management is basically saying, "Lol, you didn't actually take our agreement to this deal to actually be binding, right? Here's the next round of concessions that we want."

Nabb1:mediablitz: Brainwashed Americans, believing working yourself to death is the only way to defeat "socialism".

A work ethic is for proles.

I thought that the proles, in this case, were the ones who got the job done. Management got caught with their pants down because they were lazy and stupid. Meanwhile, the "proles" got what they wanted because their betters were busy proving themselves to be their lessers.

What I'm getting from this is that management should be fired and control given to the workers. They're obviously smarter than the people in charge.

6 weeks of paid vacation, or total time off (vacation and sick time)? Either way, its way too much, but, if you include sick time with vacation it makes a difference. Not that they don't have an important job, but, they can always stop the train if they feel messed up. In my line of work, stopping/pulling over isn't an option. You need to be 100% from minute 1.

Rincewind53:The United States?Nothing. We get nothing. There is literally no law guaranteeing vacation time, unlike almost every other country in the world.

Freedom isn't free time. You want to become wealthy and successful like the CEO that runs your company? Work 120 hours every week for the next forty years, and you may just contribute a tenth of what he does to the world. Until then, stop complaining.

mrlewish:Someone else has it good. We can't let them have it.[leanneellington.com image 400x300]

thurstonxhowell:Nabb1: mediablitz: Brainwashed Americans, believing working yourself to death is the only way to defeat "socialism".

A work ethic is for proles.

I thought that the proles, in this case, were the ones who got the job done. Management got caught with their pants down because they were lazy and stupid. Meanwhile, the "proles" got what they wanted because their betters were busy proving themselves to be their lessers.

What I'm getting from this is that management should be fired and control given to the workers. They're obviously smarter than the people in charge.

mediablitz: Brainwashed Americans, believing working yourself to death is the only way to defeat "socialism".

Yeah, that 1.2 hours or so of extra work per work day is a real killer (about 1500 hours/year for France, about 1800 hours/year for the US). Of course, the American workers make about 1.4 times as much money on average (OECD statistics).

Six weeks? Geez. I usually feel pretty lucky to get the four I do each year, and that is only vacation and holiday time. We don't technically get sick leave, but I believe they allow us three days before they expect us to start paying it back.

/Don't even take all of it most years.//Thankfully, I can roll much of it over from year to year.///Sitting on close to 8 weeks of vacation time right now.

It's the American way, the public demands public workers work for crap wages with no vacation or sick time, that way we get the crappiest employees, so the public can opine about how crappy the entire government is.

BMFPitt:BART officials said a family medical leave provision giving its 2,300 union workers up to six weeks of paid time off each year...

So this is in addition to how many weeks of vacation and sick time?

What is being disputed is paid time under the Family Medical Leave Act. The Family Medical Leave Act give a worker 12 weeks off unpaid for extended personal or family medical problems. The contract that Bart signed gave paid time off for 6 of those weeks. That is what they are disputing.

Now, I'm not even in a union and I get 3 weeks vacation, 2 weeks sick time, and 1 week personal time for a total of 6 paid weeks off. And on top of that, if I were to qualify for the Family Medical Leave, I would have the first 6 weeks off paid also without having to use any of my vacation or sick time. After 6 weeks then it would start to dip into whatever vacation, sick and personal time I have.

This is not unreasonable, especially when you consider the 6 weeks of paid time only kick in if the person is using the Family Leave act, and you have to qualify for that, and that isn't something that you can just walk into HR on Monday and say you are taking Family Medical Leave.

But this isn't straight vacation, it's family medical leave time. You have be dying, giving birth or dealing with a parent with dementia to qualify.What percentage of their workers do they think will fall into those categories each year?

kab:rustypouch: People are saying that there's such a thing as too much vacation?

People have no problem with the vacation time they get. It's everyone ELSE that gets too much of it.

Republicans believe that any time off they get they earned. Any time off other people get, especially public employees, is nothing more than theft. Unless it's the CEO, then he earned those weeks off, as well as his massive salary.

PastryChef:But this isn't straight vacation, it's family medical leave time. You have be dying, giving birth or dealing with a parent with dementia to qualify.What percentage of their workers do they think will fall into those categories each year?

This.

People act like you can just walk into HR and declare you are taking Family Medical Leave. A lot of people in this thread will now make post claiming that they know somebody who has taken Family Medical Leave 3 times so far this year.

Americans don't get time off. We have to pay for our outlandish military that defends, South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, The Somalia coast, Canada, Europe, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Afghanistan, and various other places. Being the world police has a cost, and the American middle class pay it.